The modern world is immersed in the sea of gadgets. The older generations grumpy say that modern kids are born with smartphones in their hands. They are, indeed… and then go to the colleges and use the gadgets to write essays about themselves using gadgets.
So, if you really got such a task – here are some tips for making your essay perfect:
- Don’t try to blame or advocate technology itself
Technological progress is inevitable. Unless you are a Luddite (that is dubious, because you are reading this text from the screen of your gadget), you are using the fruits of progress that have been grown since ancient times. But technological progress isn’t particularly good or evil by itself – in fact, there are too few “purely good” or “purely evil” things in our world. It is humanity using it for good or evil deeds or making us think that technology is either good or evil.
Don’t talk about technology that way. The chainsaw can be used to build a house or to murder people, the same is true for any technological item. If you want to talk about moral and ethical aspects of technology, use the views of society, pros and cons, examples of inappropriate or harmful usage of it.
- Don’t be afraid to use your personal experience as a reference
Your memories and experience are the best things to use in such an essay. The graphs and statistics are really cool and useful, and they should be included too (if you have them, of course), but you were – or are – a teenager yourself, so why don’t you use your own experience to tell about issues, struggles and wonderful things of technical progress from your own point of view? You can tell how you use technology in your daily life: for entertainment (like watching films) or education (like finding essay examples on sites like https://studymoose.com/ for your assignment).
Don’t try to tidy up your experience and squeeze it into a socially acceptable answer. If you had issues with technological progress or used the gadgets improperly – and you feel safe enough to tell about it – do it! The essay is best when the live experience is included. We aren’t perfect people who always do what textbooks say. Our own mistakes, resolutions and epiphanies are things that make our experience so precious and worth sharing.
- Know your gadgets. Know your teenagers.
If you are going to talk not about the technology in general, but about the influence of particular gadgets to the teenagers, try to get as much information about these gadgets – and their primary teenage audience – as you can. Why they are craving for the new iPhone so much: because of its extraordinary technical parameters or because of marketing strategy? How Instagram influenced the development of new phone cameras? Are gaming laptops really popular amongst teenagers or they are considered nerdy and bulky?
There are lots of different and still unexplored problems that are connected with particular gadgets or particular teenage community. Insta-people and cameras, nerds and powerful gaming PCs, PC gamers versus PSP gamers, cute gadgets for anime lovers or dark ones for goths and underground fans?
- Try to present several different points of view
Your experience is truly valuable, but to make your essay more objective, try to add some other point of view. You may also use your own life as a reference, telling about your friends’ and family’s opinions, or you may tell about how you saw their opinions as a teenager.
If you don’t have such experience, try to find some opposing points of view and present their arguments in your essay. Why do you think the opinions are so polarized? Is it because of negative (or positive) personal experience, different values, different social groups or something else? You may support one of these opinions wholeheartedly, but try to walk a mile in the shoes of the other side to understand why that particular different opinion exists at all and what are the points of its supporters.
- After talking about teenagers try to see the broader context
Teenagers are part of society. Moreover, they are somewhat dependent on their parents still. They are also the target audience of different marketologists, who make products especially appealing for the people of that age. How does the rest of the world treat teenagers with gadgets? What is the reaction to the influence of technological progress to young people?
Try to search for the special teenagers-oriented gadgets. Why do they exist? What exact traits do manufacturers use to make teenagers buy them? What are marketing strategies and what games, applications, quests, trends or whatever promote these gadgets? Are there protest teenage movements that don’t buy it (literally and figuratively)? Gadgets are interesting all by themselves, but they can be a part of awesome changes in the world.
Writing about technology is always somewhat complicated because you have to study that technology first – but we hope we gave you enough interesting examples to, at least, know where to look. There are plenty of gadgets that became the whole social symbols for teenagers, locally and worldwide. And there are lots of teenagers that influence the world of gadgets either by inventing them or by buying or not buying them.
Do your research and do it awesome. Good luck!
